


Cone

by AltraViolet



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: DJD - Freeform, Present Tense, Secret Solenoid, Slight blood mention, TF OC, first person POV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-01
Updated: 2020-01-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:47:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22074259
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AltraViolet/pseuds/AltraViolet
Summary: Secret Solenoid gift for spiced-shrub on tumblr!Prompt: “When the DJD first started, they have no experience in killing bots and have no idea what to do with the first bot (can be any mech) on the List. Situation turns awkward/hilarious where no one gets hurt. In the end, the bot escapes and the DJD mistaken it as their first kill.”
Comments: 14
Kudos: 30
Collections: Secret Solenoid '19-'20





	Cone

Oh my god, look at this guy. Size of a building and he's trying to tip toe nonchalantly up to a line of bright red safety cones. He looks up and down the runway, as if he isn't the most conspicuous thing on the whole airfield.

“Hey!” I whisper. “Psst! Third cone on the _left.”_

Ultra Magnus's eyes narrow. He crosses the runway and stoops way, way down. I can see the whirring bits in his eyes. “Are you Cone?” he asks in a voice he probably thinks is a whisper but that thunders through me.

“Duh! What do I look like, Ramje- whoa!” 

The big guy grabs me and lifts me in the air. Way, wayyy up high. He flips me over and snorts at the Decepticon badge stamped on my base. “Hmph. Must be.” 

“Put me down!” I squirm. My cone mode is compact. I wriggle between his fingertips.

Ultra Magnus sets me on his shoulder. I blend in with all the other things he has going on up there- chunky guns and lights and missile mods. Yeesh. 

“Remain in that mode until I give you the all-clear,” he mutter-rumbles from the corner of his mouth.

“Aye aye,” I say. My view is obscured by his ginormous shoulders, but I can tell when we've left the airfield. We enter a building. He stomps around. Even the other Autobots scurry out of his way. Every once in a while he stops someone and gives them a lecture/citation for leaning against the wall too hard. Finally, we get to a room filled with monitors and security cameras and he sets me down on the table. 

“Transform,” he says, pulling up a chair. He already has a data pad and a stylus ready. They're dwarfed in his hands. He sits up perfectly straight. Always a bad sign.

I transform. To Ultra Magnus's surprise – like everyone else's – all my bright red cone parts fold up on the inside. My robot form is a uniform gray with rounded corners. “Bet you never met a minicon triple changer before,” I say, and strut across the table. “Third mode is a rectangular prism. Not as exciting as the cone, though. All gray.” I go to demonstrate but he puts up a hand to stop me.

“You had an encounter with the DJD recently, correct?”

“Yeah.”

“State your name,” he says in the tone of voice that means Everything You Say From Here On Out Is Being Recorded. I swear his biolights grow brighter as he begins the formal process of the interview.

“Cone,” I say. “It's better than 'Rectangular Prism,' ain't it?”

He ignores the question. “This meeting is your official request to apply to the Autobot Asylum Program, henceforth referred to as the AAP. Your application carries the intrinsic assertion that you intend to cast off your Decepticon alliance, that you are willing and able to complete the process to become a pledged Autobot, and that you are not a spy. Failure to complete the process will result in ejection from the AAP. Espionage will be punished to the fullest extent of the Autobot Code. Understood?”

“Yeah.” A little pit of dread forms in my tanks. I never wanted to be an Autobot. 

“State your reason for applying to the AAP.”

“I got myself on The List. The DJD think they killed me. They think I'm dead. I can't be a Decepticon anymore.”

“Summarize the incident that placed your name on The List.”

“I work at the ammunitions factory, right? I'm in charge of cordoning off chemical spills. If you know Decepticons, you know I'm always working overtime. I took one little break and the wet floor I was supposed to be warning everyone about...” I sit down on the table. “Megatron was inspecting the factory. He slipped on the puddle, fell, bruised his dignity and all the sudden I'm at the top of The List.” I wait for a reaction. It is the only thing I had been looking forward to about this whole meeting. Ultra Magnus gives none. Unbelievable. The sight of Megatron falling on his aft had made Turmoil laugh for an hour straight. Dejected, I continue. “First minicon on The List, too. What a distinction. Put that in my record. It's a _distinction.”_

“When did you have the encounter with the DJD?”

“A couple days ago,” I say. “Stowed away on transports til I got here.”

“How long were you on the airfield?”

“14 hours.”

Ultra Magnus mutters about security and scribbles extra hard on the data pad. “You exited the transport and immediately transformed and hid among the preexisting traffic cones, correct?”

“Yup! I blended right in. You walked by me a few times.”

“Did you go anywhere else on this base between the time you exited the transport and when I picked you up just now?”

“No.”

Ultra Magnus writes for so long, I almost fall asleep. His voice jolts me out of an uneasy rest. “State the names of the DJD members present at the encounter.”

“Uh.” I wonder why this mech doesn't know. _Everyone_ knows their names. “Tarn, Tesarus, Helex, Vos, and Kaon. You know. There's always five. Named after the cities.”

Ultra Magnus finally shows some kind of emotion via raising an ocular ridge. But only so far. Probably only the amount permissible by the Autobot Code. “According to the last intelligence we received, they were down a member.”

I shrug and lie down on the table. If I bunch up the kibble on my back the right way, I can recline against it. I cross my legs and put my hands behind my head. Might as well be comfortable while I relive my trauma. “There was definitely five. I was their first List victim.”

Both eyebrows go up this time. “Really?”

“Yeah.”

“How do you know that?”

“Tarn said so.” 

While Ultra Magnus scribbles some more, I wonder what Autobot rations are like. I wonder if they have Fight Nights and poker and death poker and super death poker. My pack of cards is the only thing I had with me when I fled. I wonder if there are any other minicons around. Maybe they call 'em minibots on this side.

“The AAP endeavors to take in and rehabilitate all Decepticons that seek asylum,” says Ultra Magnus. “Usually this process takes a few weeks, but given that your DJD encounter was so recent, I will fast-track your application. The data you provide about the DJD and the ammunitions factory will be invaluable.”

“Ultra gear!” I say. “Do you guys play super death poker?”

“What?” Ultra Magnus shakes his head. “You will now give a statement regarding your encounter with the DJD. Provide as many details as possible. Even the slightest nuances of their gaits can reveal a weakness.”

“Uh,” I say. “They're not fences. They don't have gates.”

Ultra Magnus sighs. “Begin. You are being recorded.”

~~

Uhh. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Uhh. Okay. I'm at work, right? And it's the night shift. Double time. Over time. Whatever you wanna call it, except we don't get double pay. Hey, do Autobots get double pay for their overtime? No? Damn. Okay. Anyway. The ammunitions factory is located on Shub Lunar 17-B, a big ol' moon that got smashed up and then crunched back down into a moon again by gravity. All the good metals are at the surface so you don't gotta mine too deep to get them. The factory is HUGE. I mean HUGE. And not just cuz I'm a minicon. _You_ would get lost in it. The factory floor is a big ol' maze of piping and vats and racking and shelving. The facility also has a refueling station for flight mode types and small space vessels. And a repair bay that specializes in Seeker frames. That's pretty good intel, right? Can I get extra rations?? No? Damn. Okay.

My job is to put out the cones. Duh. They scanned me and constructed a buncha sparkless minicons shaped like cones. I call them my cone clones, cuz I'm clever with wordplay. They can transform and stuff. They kinda have robot modes, like they can stand on two legs and they got arms but no head, and the arms have tools instead of hands. They double as helpers for maintenance or they go into the ammo machinery to de-clog it when it gets clogged. But they aren't smart and they tend to get in the way and piss people off. So, mostly they stay in cone mode and it's my job to go around and put them down where the chemical spills happen. After the Spill Team cleans it up and we get the okay, I go back and pick 'em all up again. I store them in a mezzanine near the furnaces and energon tanks, cuz those are the things that break down the most. I sleep in the mezzanine, too, cuz it's free. They never gave me quarters. 

Anyway, it's night time, and I'm running around avoiding Turmoil cuz the Megatron Incident happened earlier in the day and I just wanted to make myself as scarce as possible. All the daytime lights are off. Just emergency lights on. I'm little enough that I don't set off the alarm sensors. So I'm running around, checking the gauges on the energon tanks even though that's not my job, but the mech whose job it is can't read so I do it so we don't all get exploded by overheating or something. And also sometimes I sneak a little energon. Weapons grade energon don't taste too good but the rations don't either.

But then I hear a sound.

And the big lights come on.

I crouch down on the pipe I'd been standing on, tuck myself right into the U-bend. Cuz this is weird. The overhead lights never come on at night. 

And then I hear voices. It's Turmoil and Ramjet and some mech I've never heard before. I hear lots and lots of footsteps. I peek around the pipe.

It's Turmoil and Ramjet and _five_ mechs I've never seen before. Turmoil looks _really_ happy, which I don't think I gotta tell you, is a really bad sign. Ramjet looks like he's about to forcibly eject his rations, his wings are twitching like crazy. And the five mechs are looking around the place, grinning. All different shapes and sizes and colors. I have no idea why these five are together. Usually tanks hang with tanks, and guns hang with guns. But this is a mixed group. They don't have any badges showing they're in a particular infantry together, except the Deceptibrand.

Turmoil says some stuff and Ramjet stammers some stuff and then they get outta there, and it's just me and these five mechs who went to Bludgeon University to learn how to smile. This is when I start getting a bad feeling in the back of my processor. Like, maybe I should get out of there. Right now.

One of the mechs is purple and his face is the Decepticon badge, but bigger and on his face. He has a cape and tank tread parts and he's swaggering around. “Our first job! Megatron just sent me a _private_ message. We must dispose of a Decepticon known to work in this facility.”

“What'd he do?” This mech has no eyes and I can't tell what his alt mode is. He has weird spiral things coming off his shoulders. His voice has that scratchy undertone mechs get when they suck down too many electrical surges. He gives me the creeps.

“That most heinous crime,” says badge face. He leans forward to put some tenseness into the moment. _“Breaching protocol.”_

“That's it?” asks no-eyes. “He wasn't a spy or a traitor or something?”

“His breach resulted in an _embarrassing incident,”_ snaps badge face.

“Pff,” says no-eyes. _“He's_ an embarrassing incident.” No-eyes jerks a thumb at one of the big guys behind him.

“Hey,” says the big guy. He speaks slowly. I'm familiar with the type. Big on the strong. Not so big on the smarts. He has an X covering his eyes. What's with these mechs and eyes?

“Let's get 'im,” says the other big guy.

“Not yet,” says badge face. “Speaking of protocol, first we have to take roll call.”

“What?” says no-eyes. _“Why?”_

“Because it's part of the protocol.” Badge face pulls a data pad from subspace with a flourish. “Tarn?” He glances at the others, then bows. “Here.” 

One of the big guys claps. The other one looks confused, then claps, too. He has four arms, so together it sounds like _clap clapclap._

“Thank you, thank you,” says Tarn. He squints at the data pad. “Kaon?”

No-eyes waves a hand and says, “here.”

“Helex?”

Four arms says, “here.” I can't tell what his alt mode is, but looking at his frame makes my lines go cold. I work with equipment that melts metals. This mech melts metals with his frame. He has the tell-tale blast door on his torso. There's blood all around it.

At this point, the back of my processor is banging on the front of my processor and I'm thinking, isn't it weird these mechs are named after cities...

“Vos?”

 _“Sweotolae.”_ The thinnest mech raises a hand. He's definitely a rifle alt mode. I'm almost relieved I can identify it. I have no idea what he said, though. It was in another language.

“Tesarus?”

The big guy with the X on his face booms out, “here.”

“Excellent. Then we are assembled,” says Tarn. He tucks the data pad away and pulls out another one.

And then it hits me. Five mechs with city names.

This is the goddamn DJD.

I'm shaking.

“Where's your gun?” asks Tesarus. “Didn't you get a fusion canon?”

“It's being modified,” says Tarn, looking at his right forearm. “I'm having it adapted to better suit our needs, as Megatron would have wanted. It will serve us _all_ well to emulate Megatron at every opportunity.”

“Megatron don't wear a cape-”

“Shut up!” Tarn resets his vocalizer all dramatic-like and reads from the data pad. “For the Level One Infraction of Aggravated Desertion of a Post, the Decepticon known as _Cone_ is hereby sentenced to death.”

I scarcely hear the DJD clap again. _Desertion of a post!!_ I'm mad. And scared. It's not my fault Megatron can't see a puddle the size of Trypticon! Seriously, who strolls through a Decepticon ammunition factory without watching where they're going??

“Cone looks like this,” Tarn is saying, brandishing a data pad with a picture of me on it. There's literally nothing more nightmare fuel-y than Tarn holding up your picture. “Last known whereabouts is this sector of the facility. Decepticons, go forth and _cleanse.”_

The DJD give a mix of sloppy salutes and affirmative grunts and spread out. 

I freeze, digging my hands into the U-bend of the pipe. I think of the horror stories I've heard: how the DJD hunts down deserters and traitors and rips them apart. I'd always heard Helex is a small mech, though. And Kaon is a tank. Tarn had said this was their first job. Had all the previous members been killed and new mechs rotated through?

I don't have time to think about it, though. I have 2.4 seconds to think of a plan to save myself before Tesarus lumbers too close. I shove all my stupid feelings of scaredness deep inside and scamper up the pipe. I may not have guns or a big scary alt mode or dead sparkless eyes, but I do have one major advantage: I know this ammo factory inside and out.

I run along the pipe, take a leap, smack into the next pipe, and haul myself upwards. I finally claw my way up to the mezzanine. From here I can see most of the DJD members stalking around the factory floor. They move randomly around the racking, shoving stuff on the shelves around, spilling stuff on the floor. I feel an instinctual twitch- _I gotta put some cones down and call the Spill Team!_

And then I realize... I have another advantage.

I grab the nearest cone clone and shake it online. “I'm promoting you to senior admiral of self-sacrifice!” The cone clone stands silently, its tool-hands going through their little calibration motions. I send the cone clone the location of the spill. It charges down the staircase at the end of the mezzanine and runs across the floor.

“Whoa!” Helex aims and fires directly at the cone clone. It explodes into pieces with a burst of blue light. “I got 'im!”

“What? Really?” Tarn asks. He whistles and the DJD members converge on Helex. “What happened?”

“He was headed straight for me!” says Helex. “Heh heh. Got 'im.” He twirls his gun. It flies off his finger. Grumbling, he retrieves it from the floor.

“That's... unexpected,” says Tarn.

Kaon kicks at the cone clone's torso. “Something doesn't feel right about this.”

Tarn stoops and picks up the torso. He holds it up to the lights, moving it back and forth.

Vos says something but I can't understand him.

“You're right,” says Tarn slowly. “No evidence of a spark chamber.”

 _Damn!_ Well, clones can't be as good as the original. I need a new plan.

I send a command to the cone clones. They online and whir their hand-tools, waiting for orders. I don't have enough processing power to command all 254 cone clones individually so I just spray a mix of “fix the thing!” and “unclog the thing!” orders and hope for the best. The cone clones jump to their feet and take off in different directions. Most of them stampede down the stairs. A few fling themselves right off the mezzanine. I hear startled yells from below.

Chaos ensues. Pure, unadulterated madness, as the cone clones are unleashed into the facility. Hundreds of tiny footsteps sound in every direction. A few go swimming in the energon tanks, tripping the contamination alarms. Some of them crawl up to the ceiling and bash the light bulbs out. I don't have a lot of biolights, but the DJD do. The factory gets dimmer. I see the DJD as patches of red and purple light running between the racking and tanks.

“Good clones,” I say to myself.

The two big mechs take off in different directions after the cone clones, stomping and smashing them. Kaon walks around carefully. I'm not sure if he can see or not. He navigates slowly, quirking his head side to side. Vos stalks between the tanks like a shadow. He's definitely the creepiest one of them all. Tarn pulls a pistol from subspace and picks off cone clones as they race across the floor. Everyone's yelling. As more bulbs go out, the glow of the energon tanks becomes the main light source. Everything turns a creepy blood-pink color. I watch from above, waiting for a chance to slide down a pipe and run to the exit.

But a chance doesn't come. The cone clones are running erratically and so the DJD are, too. There's never a clear path to the exit.

I make a new plan.

I skirt down a pipe and duck between the big energon tanks. I nab an offline cone clone body and hold it close until Helex runs by.

“AHHH!” I scream, and fling the body right into his path.

“Huh?!” He half stomps, half trips over the cone clone and goes sprawling. He hits the floor with a THUD!

“Oh!” I cry pathetically. “You... killed me...” 

Helex scrambles to his feet and squints all around. His eyes fall on the cone clone and he snatches it. “I got him! Again!” Helex triumphantly waves it in the air.

Tarn materializes behind him. “That's not the right one,” he snaps. “He has a head in the picture.”

 _Dammit!_ The cone clones have no spark chambers and no heads. I glance at the crumpled cone clone. And also no hands... 

As the two stalk away, I reevaluate. I grab another offline cone clone and press myself against the tank and slowly, slowly walk around it. I head for the racking nearby- huge metal shelves set up in rows across the factory floor. I wiggle underneath the lowest shelf, stow the cone clone next to me, and wait.

It doesn't take long until Tesarus comes stomping over. I run out right in front of him, stare him straight in the X, and yell, “oh no!” Then I run back and dive under the racking.

Tesarus shoots indiscriminately. I frantically pull the tools out of the cone clone's wrists and throw them to the floor so they make a loud clanking sound. “Oh no!” I cry. “My hands got shot off!”

“Haw haw!”

I roll to the side as Tesarus shoots in the direction of my voice. I heft the cone clone and toss it away from me. It clangs onto the floor. “Oh no!” I scream as loud as I can. “My spark chamber disintegrated!”

Tesarus stomps closer, shooting into the racking. Containers explode around me. I swing myself up onto the next shelf and transform into my rectangular prism mode. It feels... weird. I only transform to this mode when people say I'm lying about being a triple changer. 

“Oh no!” I shout. “My head got shot off!”

The big lug laughs. “Haw haw. Lost your head.” He roots around for a minute, using laser bullets as a flashlight, then finds the cone clone. He picks it up. “Tarn! I got him!”

The other DJD members run over. I slow my venting and dial my meager biolights as low as they will go. I sit as still as I can. 

“How do you know that's him?” asks Tarn.

“Cuz his head came off,” says Tesarus. “He ain't got one no more.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yup.” Tesarus shakes the cone clone. “No head.”

Vos says something I don't understand. 

“Are his hands there?” asks Kaon. “These grunts have tools instead.”

“Nope. I shot 'em off, too,” says Tesarus. “See? No hands.”

Tarn makes a disbelieving noise. “And the spark chamber?”

“Disintegrated.”

I can _feel_ Tarn's disbelief. “Does anyone register any movement?”

There are a few quiet seconds. All the cone clones are silent. There are no tiny footsteps. They've all been smashed. Then Vos says something.

“Is that so?” says Tarn.

To my utter horror, Tarn stomps right up to the shelf I'm on and pushes everything on it aside, revealing me.

“You!” Tarn points at me. My tanks threaten to empty. I see my life flash before my eyes. I can feel The Well pulling at my spark. “Identify yourself!”

Somehow, I squeak out. “...Box? Con? Boxcon. I'm Boxcon.”

“Boxcon,” repeats Tarn.

“Yeah.” I reset my vocalizer and try to make my voice sound lower and less frightened. “Cuz I'm a box, see?”

Tarn narrows his eyes and that's when I realize he has eyes behind the mask and they're red and I've never been more scared in my entire life. In the most sonorous, majestic, terrifying voice I've ever heard he demands, _“where is Cone!”_

“Dead,” I squeak. “He just got killed right in front of me. Hail Megatron!!”

Tarn looks me over again. It doesn't take long. Have I mentioned I'm a minicon? Then he shoves all the stuff on the shelf back in front of me. I stifle a sigh of relief as containers block my view of him.

“DJD!” Tarn proclaims. I swear I can hear his cape swishing. “Congratulations! We can cross the first name off The List!” 

They whoop and holler.

“But, just to be sure... pile up all the bodies. We'll dispose of them, in case he's hiding among the corpses.”

A shiver runs through my lines.

The DJD spend an hour gathering all the cone clones and piling them in the middle of the factory floor. I shuffle to the edge of the shelf. I don't want to look, but I can't not look. Tarn and Vos kick at the cone clones. Kaon sniffs their arm nubs like a weirdo. Tesarus has a hungry look on his face. Helex has his back to me so I can't see what he's doing, but it's probably something gross.

“There are hundreds of them,” says Kaon.

“But did we get them _all?”_ asks Tarn. 

Vos shrugs. 

“Dump them,” orders Tarn.

The DJD dump the hundreds of cone clones into one of the ammo sorting vats. That vat is super not supposed to have metal in it. I _almost_ cry out. Dumping that much metal into an unprepared vat will do terrible things to the energon! But according to the DJD, I'm officially dead. What do I care? I mull over my options, planning what to do once I get out of here. The cone clones hiss and sink beneath the surface of the liquid. The energon bubbles and froths. The panels on the sides of the tank light up. Alarms go off. Helex punches the panels until they're quiet again.

“Well... I suppose that's it. We've done it! Our first job is complete. Lord Megatron will be pleased.” Tarn takes The List out with a flourish and makes a big show of crossing off my name with one claw-tipped finger.

“What's next?” asks Kaon.

“We pick up our new starship. I think you'll really like the design.”

I miss the rest of their discussion because I'm fighting the impulse to go offline in disbelief. I lied to _Tarn_ of the freakin _DJD_ and now they're _walking away_ and oh my god _I'm going to survive this._

I wait until their footsteps fade and the last of the lights go dark and the alarms time out. Then, very very quietly, I transform back to robot mode and run like hell to the loading docks.

~~

“I hopped a few transports and made my way here. And uhh... that's it.”

Ultra Magnus nods gravely. “How much of a scrutinizing look would you say Tarn gave you, while you were on the shelf?”

“Uh. Maybe good? I dunno. It was pretty dark.”

Ultra Magnus nods gravely again. He's really good at doing that. After a few follow up questions, he submits my form. “It occurs to me,” he says wryly, “that the DJD caused more disruption and destruction to the ammo factory than you ever did.”

“Heh... yeah.” _Suckers._

It doesn't take long to hear back from whoever Ultra Magnus sent my info to. “Your application has been accepted,” he says. 

“Yayyyy.” I don't know whether I mean it or not. Anything's better than the DJD, right? Even being an Autobot?

“I will give you a temporary badge, but you must attend classes on the Autobot Code and pass an exam before your registration is complete.”

“Uggghhh.”

“You have been assigned a new designation. From here on out, you will no longer use your cone mode. You will _only_ transform to your rectangular prism mode. Understood?”

I gulp and nod. I don't really like my rectangular prism mode. But oh well. Better get used to it. 

“Transform.”

I do so. Maybe I can modify this mode with new paint to make it more interesting. Or get some add-ons, some wheels or biolights or slots for weapons or something.

Ultra Magnus pulls an Autobot badge from subspace and peels the backing off. It's a sticker. He slaps it to my side. “Your new name is Toaster. Welcome to the team, Autobot.”

Toaster?! _Thanks,_ DJD.

**Author's Note:**

> Wishing you Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year, spiced-shrub!
> 
> "Sweotolae," the word Vos says, is Old English for "I am become manifest."


End file.
